Vaccines are used to stimulate an immune response in an individual to provide protection against and/or treatment for a particular disease. Some vaccines include an antigen to induce the immune response. Some antigens elicit a strong immune response while other antigens elicit a weak immune response. A weak immune response to an antigen can be strengthened by including an adjuvant with the vaccine. Adjuvants come in many different forms such as aluminum salts, oil, emulsions, sterile constituents of bacteria and/or pathogens.
DNA vaccine induced immunity can be enhanced by co-delivery of synthetic gene encoding molecular adjuvants as well. Many of these adjuvants have included cytokines and chemokines that have been demonstrated to enhance vaccine-induced immunity by increasing the magnitude or type of immune response and/or protective efficacy. Through the use of molecular adjuvants, immune responses can be highly customizable and functionally tailored for optimal efficacy against pathogen specific (i.e., infectious agent) or non-pathogen (i.e., cancer) antigens.
In addition to these molecular adjuvants, vaccines are also administered in many different ways (e.g., injection, orally, etc.) into many different tissues (e.g., intramuscular, intradermal etc.). Not all delivery methods, are equal and require greater compliance within a population of individuals while other delivery methods may affect the immunogenicity and/or safety of the vaccine. There remains a need in the art for the development of safe and more effective adjuvants, and in particular, molecular adjuvants combined with particular delivery methods in order to provide a customizable and functionally tailored vaccination for optimal efficacy against pathogenic and non-pathogenic antigens.